Quote:Just dispelling illusions, one at a time. You seem to have missed the point.

Well, nobody has any illusions that Ubisoft has some marketing plan about Heroes VI. The complaint is about something pretty different - that this plan, whatever it is, totally sucks.

Quote:But we have a responsibility to tell you if we know there's a reason why some decision was taken, and to keep you informed if and when we can, marketing or no marketing. To do any less would mean we're not doing enough and should be replaced. And if a particular criticism is fair, inaccurate or outright wrong, we're in a position to say so.

I don't know why you're saying you want less input from us?

In this case these are Ubisoft's reasons and they have to state them themselves. It's not like these complaints started recently, they had the opportunity to say something on more than one occassion. Instead... what do we have instead? The silence of the lambs, that's what.

Quote:And on the contrary, now we're going to have the best game of the series with the worst possible town screens. Arguably, so.

Q:What are the main changes to Heroes 6?
A: Compared to Heroes 5 and its predecessors (like heroes 3 or 4) we have mainly changed 2 elements of the game: one of them is the RPG element. We wanted to make sure that the player has full control over his/her character, its creation and its development (...goes on to describe the tears/blood system...). The second element we changed is the increased focus on strategy instead of management, especially micromanagement. Now you feel more like a general in battle and less like a city planer

To me the above quote arguably reveals the crucial decision factor behind the town window change. Ubihole seems to be oblivious of the simple fact that the management part of Heroes is exactly as important as Tactics (it is essentially part of it).
They are obviously assuming that having an elaborate town building system reduces the gameplay experience of a Heroes game in a certain way.
Judging now by the little that we know about "town windows", it is apparent to me that they decided to dumb down the town screens (e.g. smaller size, no interactivity), not for aesthetic reasons, but in order to increase the pace and/or enhance the rpg element of the game.
In other words, I am afraid that Heroes 6 might suffer from the Dragon Age II / Mass Effect 3 syndrome (oversimplification of a successful formula to allow for faster gameplay and accessibility to the masses).

And my big question is: If the above is indeed correct, why are they so frantically insisting that they are listening actively to Heroes gamers' feedback??

I hope I am not reading too much into the above, wanted to share my thoughts with you anyway.

On a positive note, from a graphical perspective the 6th installment is hands down the best in the series so far.

@Soilburn: I think that there has been too much complaining about the town windows....really I agree with Erwan that we don't want to feel like city planners.....I think most people are mistaken thinking that the 2D town windows will take away the strategy of building but this is not the case....all they are doing is making the town windows quicker and easier to access. The town tree system of H5 is taken away as the H6 hero's skills now have this tree system!

The full video to your german one posted is on the hungarian site released in Feb 2011....

You know I just finished campaign of Crysis 2 and great game, great graphics, but I finished it in 3 days flat. Not really interested in the multiplayer of it, but I know that H6 campaign will take a few weeks.....and the multiplayer.....infinite gaming!

Quote:I think that there has been too much complaining about the town windows....

I tend to agree. Either you people are reading to much into a possibly badly translated interview and several statements. Or you people are just a bunch of complainers.
Don't rip of something you haven't seen, tried or used before. Use it, then and only then you have the right to complain, whine and rant.
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Iron from Ice.

Well, I really like the town screens for the down-time they offer, kinda there to give me a sense of comfort.
I never actually thought of them as complex, I'd say towns could be much more dynamic instead of having them simplified.
In Heroes V I pretty much had a preset sequence for building every town with only slight deviations from game to game depending on available resources or close enemy players or a certain prominent creep stack guarding a potent artifact.

To me, personally, the town screen was almost relaxing, and I'm not saying that's a bad thing, I could even spend time just staring at the thing (not in multiplayer obviously) and addoring all the little details, this was especially true for the gorgeus art of Heroes III town screens or the beautiful architecture of Heroes V.

I dunno, somehow to me townscreens are an important part of the experiance but I can't say that so far, they've given me much pause for thought when it comes to complexity.
I guess to me, it's a feel thing, and I'll be ok with HoMMVI if they can keep the feel, the whole town window thing has me worried I'll admit, but I don't feel outright rage. (not saying you shouldn't, I just don't.)

Quote:...all they are doing is making the town windows quicker and easier to access. The town tree system of H5 is taken away as the H6 hero's skills now have this tree system!

We DON'T WANT the quicker (sic) and easier to access towns. We want that Heroes feel when you enter the town. See the photos above? As Alc put it, they are STUNNING. I expected nothing less from H6. Transpose the awsome adventure map graphics into town screens, not give us a gold chest choice...

Quote:I think that there has been too much complaining about the town windows....really I agree with Erwan that we don't want to feel like city planners.....

There will be enough complaining only when they will decide to drop town windows and return to full screens. And I wanna feel like a city planner too, when I play the game.
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Signature? I don't need no stinking signature!

I don't mind people disagreeing with the changes, but the tone can get quite exhausting and freeze out opposing views. Frankly, I think the rage on these boards is impotent, as far as influencing Ubisoft is concerned. Not to mention how often it has been discussed already...

Not to mention the sheer beauty and atmosphere of full town screens that was represented well both in 2D and 3D, if it's gone it will simply disappoint me a lot (and many others) while also taking away a big aspect of a faction's identity IMO.

And I don't care if they're 2D or 3D, as long as they're there. 2D in HOMM 1-4 showed great screens like H2 Sorceress, Necromancer, H3 Conflux, Rampart, Dungeon, Fortress, Stronghold, Snowy Tower, and even Inferno etc. while H5 deserves a praise for it's Sylvan and Academy.

Quote:Either you people are reading to much into a possibly badly translated interview and several statements. Or you people are just a bunch of complainers.
Don't rip of something you haven't seen, tried or used before. Use it, then and only then you have the right to complain, whine and rant.

2 comments:

1. A badly translated interview... on Ubi's own site? The odds are pretty low.

2. If not now, when the time left to release (give or take 3 months) is probably enough to still implement some functional changes in the game, when should one raise his concerns then?

The quote above about Ubi wanting the Heroes gamer to be less of a "city planer" is imo as authentic as it gets. The question is, how much are we allowed to read into it?

Quote:I tend to agree. Either you people are reading to much into a possibly badly translated interview and several statements. Or you people are just a bunch of complainers.
Don't rip of something you haven't seen, tried or used before. Use it, then and only then you have the right to complain, whine and rant.

OK, let me explain something to you and the other "wait before" parrots. There is this thing which people call pattern. It has various uses and isn't misuse-proof but most of the time it serves its purpose. This purpose is to help the said people predict something before it occurs. Familiarize yourself with the pattern and you may even become friends.
Here are some clues how to recognize a particular pattern, for example - that we may have rubish town windows in the end product.
- Ubisoft state that they want to reduce the management in general and of the town in particular;
- Ubisoft state that the town development will be seen on the adventure map;
- All officially confirmed information points towards speeding up the game and directing it towards the battles;
- Ubisoft answer absolutely nothing to the numerous complaints against the town windows and the "whining" of the would-be buyers;
- Whenever some of the development-related people finally decides to give some explanation to some of the controversial issues, it's usually idiotic and shows lack of understanding of what made Heroes what it is.
- Cepheus says that he'll try to arrange the town windows to be "stretchable";
- The devs consider 1 second loading time "annoying" and apparently this is enough to justify the scrapping of the full town screens.
Acceptable conclusion: There is a reasonably high probability to have rubish town windows and until proven otherwise, it is equaly reasonable to "whine". Period. Now stop whining about the whining.